London close: Footsie at 15-month high

24th Dec 2009 12:28

Miners pushed London sharply higher in a shortened trading session Thursday, getting the leading index up to 5,400 briefly and to its highest close since September 2008.Silver producer Fresnillo is top of the table on stronger metal prices, with BHP Billiton, Vedanta Resources and Rio Tinto also higher.Energy stocks Tullow Oil, Cairn Energy, Shell and BP went well as oil prices stick around the $77 a barrel mark.Banks Royal Bank of Scotland and HSBC benefited from the festive spirit. Today's rally could have been even more impressive had investors not sold off real estate plays British Land, Land Securities, Segro and Hammerson.Elsewhere, US private equity group Carlyle finally admitted it is mulling a possible cash offer for waste management firm Shanks and has held preliminary discussions with its bosses. The confirmation comes more than two weeks after UK mid-cap Shanks announced it had received a 135p a share takeover approach from a private equity group. Whitbread has agreed a sale and leaseback deal with M&G Investments that will net the hotel, pub and coffee shop group £36.65m in cash. Two non-executive directors at ITV will resign as the broadcaster continues to shuffle its boardroom ahead of the appointment of Archie Norman as chairman in January. Heather Killen and Agnès Tourain will retire as non executive directors with effect from 31 December 2009.AstraZeneca's biologics unit, Medimmune, has filed a Complete Response Letter (CRL) to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in respect of its Biologics Licence Application (BLA) for motavizumab.Balfour Beatty has acquired Strata Construction, a Doncaster-based company specialising in the construction of affordable housing. The company is being bought for a total cash consideration of £10.3m. Losses rose in Wm Ransom's latest half year, with the natural health products group also cautioning that the outlook for the current year remains uncertain. Sales in the half-year to September fell to £16.7m (2008: £17.2m), though were up 3% on a like for like basis.Gold mining and exploration company Central African Gold saw losses widen in the first half of 2009 as its Zimbabwean operations returned to production midway through the reporting period. The company had closed down its mines in Zimbabwe at the end of 2008 because of the 'adverse and political economic climate that prevailed'.Executive search firm Hexagon Human Capital tumbled into the red at the half-year stage and warned that it will probably miss full-year expectations. It posted a loss before tax of £1.95m for the six months ended 30 September versus a profit.FTSE 100 - RisersFresnillo (FRES) 793.50p +6.08%Royal Bank of Scotland Group (RBS) 29.30p +3.13%Tullow Oil (TLW) 1,298.00p +2.29%Rio Tinto (RIO) 3,370.00p +2.25%Tesco (TSCO) 426.95p +2.19%British Airways (BAY) 192.00p +2.02%Old Mutual (OML) 108.20p +1.60%Kingfisher (KGF) 225.20p +1.58%Xstrata (XTA) 1,088.00p +1.54%BG Group (BG.) 1,135.00p +1.52%FTSE 100 - FallersRSA Insurance Group (RSA) 119.10p -1.49%Smith & Nephew (SN.) 629.00p -1.26%London Stock Exchange Group (LSE) 710.00p -0.91%Rolls-Royce Group (RR.) 480.10p -0.91%Experian Group (EXPN) 614.00p -0.81%Marks & Spencer Group (MKS) 400.50p -0.72%Centrica (CNA) 274.60p -0.65%Whitbread (WTB) 1,384.00p -0.65%TUI Travel (TT.) 248.40p -0.64%Liberty International (LII) 486.50p -0.59%FTSE 250 - RisersSpirax-Sarco Engineering (SPX) 1,309.00p +8.63%Aquarius Platinum Ltd. (AQP) 395.00p +4.36%Dimension Data Holdings (DDT) 73.80p +3.94%Premier Oil (PMO) 1,118.00p +3.61%Northgate (NTG) 222.40p +3.44%Hochschild Mining (HOC) 332.60p +2.65%Dairy Crest Group (DCG) 358.20p +2.64%Carpetright (CPR) 950.00p +2.37%Carillion (CLLN) 307.10p +2.37%Petropavlovsk (POG) 1,045.00p +2.25%FTSE 250 - FallersBlueBay Asset Management (BBAY) 310.00p -3.82%St. Modwen Properties (SMP) 180.00p -3.54%Hargreaves Lansdown (HL.) 285.00p -3.39%DS Smith (SMDS) 120.70p -3.29%Bovis Homes Group (BVS) 391.50p -2.85%Intermediate Capital Group (ICP) 267.60p -2.69%Dechra Pharmaceuticals (DPH) 475.10p -2.68%Moneysupermarket.com (MONY) 74.65p -2.48%Renishaw (RSW) 545.00p -2.33%Croda International (CRDA) 778.50p -2.20%